Sweet As Cotton Candy At a County Fair
by nicalyse
Summary: Sam can't decide whether it's her or the ride that's responsible for the swooping feeling in his stomach.


"Do you get motion sickness?"

"What?" Mercedes laughs when Sam repeats the question. "That's a really weird question."

He smiles to himself. "Will you just answer me?"

"No, I don't get motion sickness."

"Awesome." It's a huge relief, because he thinks that this date he has an idea for would be way less successful if she was nauseous for most of it.

"You wanna tell me what this is about?" she asks. He thinks he can hear a smile in her voice.

"My mom got these all-day armbands for that carnival out at the fairgrounds. It was going to be like, a family thing, but my dad has a job interview in Tennessee. I thought you might want to come instead. We don't have to spend the day with my brother and sister either," he says quickly. They haven't had a lot of opportunities to go on dates that aren't just a walk through the park with some lemonade, and he wants to be sure that she knows that's what this is.

"I like them," she says quietly.

"I like them, but sometimes I need a break." Mercedes makes a noise like she understands. "I'd rather spend time alone with you anyhow."

She's quiet for a second, then, "I like you, too."

Sam smiles to himself, leaning back against the tree he's sitting under back behind the motel even though it feels like it's about a million degrees outside. Stacy and Stevie are in the room watching _Phineas and Ferb_ and they know not to unlock the door for anyone, so he has about twenty minutes to chat with Mercedes. "What have you been up to today?" he asks, settling in so he can enjoy the time he has.

* * *

><p>His mom drops him at Mercedes' place on her way out of town, and he does his best to ignore the little grin she's wearing when she says, "Tell Mercedes I said hello." He's heard all about how sweet Mercedes seems from both of his parents. Sam knows that she can get sassy and even a little mean when she wants to, but he agrees with them even if he'd never admit it. Not to them anyhow.<p>

Mercedes answers the door in blue jeans and a black, off-the-shoulder tee shirt that has fireworks made out of multi-colored glitter on the front. Her hair is in a ponytail over her shoulder, and it's got one of those feathers in it, the bright yellow sort of peeking through the dark strands that he now knows aren't all hers.

(The world of fake hair is a complete mystery to him, and he thinks he wants to keep it that way. It seems weird, but if it makes her happy, whatever.)

He leans forward to kiss her cheek the way he always does when he sees her, looking at her face when he pulls back so he can see the tiny little smile that's always there. "Hi."

She chuckles and pulls the front door closed behind her when she steps out. "Hi."

Mercedes drives, and she doesn't complain when he grabs her iPod and flicks through the summer playlist they made together to find that song by The Band Perry that he knows she likes more than she lets on. Sam doesn't have a car, so she always drives, but it never feels weird, not the way that it sometimes did with Quinn (and he didn't have his license when he was dating her). Mercedes hasn't ever acted like it's a big deal, nor has she ever handed him the keys and suggested that he drive her car, which he actually appreciates. He's pretty sure that unless she was somehow incapable of driving - bleeding or falling asleep or whatever - he'd feel like it was charity, and his pride can only handle so much of that.

When they get to the carnival, they stop at a ticket booth that's sandwiched in between the carousel and a food trailer covered in enormous, shiny signs proclaiming that they serve gourmet funnel cakes. The bored, unfriendly woman trapped inside the tiny box hands Sam two neon green plastic armbands. Mercedes fastens hers deftly on her left wrist, chuckling when she sees the way that he's still fiddling with his, attempting to twist the plastic around his wrist while holding his arm against his abdomen to keep it in place while he tries to line up the little plastic piece in the hole.

"Here," she says, taking his hand to pull his arm away from his body. It takes her all of two seconds to fasten the armband using the sort of fine motor skills honed after years of fastening her own jewelry and whatever else it is that girls do.

Sam catches her hand in his before she can pull it away, rubbing his thumb over her knuckles gently and smiling when she lifts one eyebrow. "What do you want to ride first?" he asks, glancing around. Right where they're standing, it's mostly kiddie rides, but he's pretty sure there are some bigger things further down the midway.

"I think we should start with whatever has the shortest line," she answers practically. "Then we can take it from there."

The sun is just starting to set, so the lines for things that aren't designed for little kids are all pretty short. They start on this thing called The Flying Bobs, a little two-person car that swings back and forth while it goes in a speedy, hilly circle; then they ride the Ring of Fire, basically a circular bit of roller coaster track with a car that goes around over and over again, turning the riders upside down. They argue about whether the next one is called the Spider or the Octopus, not that it really matters. Sam likes the way that Mercedes loops her arm through his every time they get on a ride, so she's pressed right up against him and he can hear the way that she giggles when she gets a little head rush. He's willing to call it the Spider if it means she'll keep doing that.

Part of the reason Sam has so much fun with Mercedes is because she's like, genuinely nice. He's not going to tell anyone, but Quinn was his first real girlfriend, and Santana was...whatever Santana was. The point is, they were both kind of mean. Well, Santana was pretty much always mean, at least a little bit, unless they were making out. And Quinn wasn't really mean to him, but watching the way that she acted with Rachel and Puck and even Santana sometimes bugged him. Mercedes has her moments, just like anyone else, but deep down, she's a really sweet person.

Sam just really, really likes her.

She tugs him toward the Tilt-a-Whirl after their second turn on the Flying Bobs. He doesn't know what's going on with the carnival and everyone else, but the lines have gotten really short, even though it isn't that late. He thinks only three of the cars on the ride have people in them, and there isn't anyone else in line.

"This was always my favorite as a kid," she tells him, leaning back against the railing behind her while they wait. "Even at a real amusement park with roller coasters and stuff, I always wanted to ride the tilt-a-whirl."

Sam smiles at her. "Really?"

"It made my brother crazy," she laughs. "He and my mom would go off and do the big superhero roller coasters, and my dad would stay back and do the tilt-a-whirl with me."

"Do you not like roller coasters?"

"They're okay." She shrugs her shoulders and glances at the ride when the noise changes, the cars slowing. "But you wait in line for an hour to spend three minutes on the thing. I don't waste time like that," she says matter-of-factly.

Sam laughs, and then the guy running the ride is waving them through the swinging metal gate. Sam lets Mercedes lead the way, and she chooses a car that's decorated with glittery purple paint, then loops her arm through his after he's pulled the metal lap bar down over their thighs. "So is coming here tonight a waste of time?" he asks her just as the ride begins to move.

She tilts her head to the side and smiles, her eyes soft. "No."

Sam can't decide whether it's her or the ride that's responsible for the swooping feeling in his stomach, but he finds himself laughing with her, goading her into lifting her arms up above her head, her hand slipping into his again when she lets out a little shriek.

He's disappointed when the ride starts to slow, and he can tell that Mercedes is too. They've been walking around and riding things for hours, but this has definitely been the best part of the night. He isn't ready for it to end.

When Sam stands to step out of the car so he can help Mercedes out, he realizes that only a handful of people are getting on, nowhere near enough to fill the ride. "Hey," he calls to the guy standing at the controls. "Can we go again?"

The man shrugs carelessly, half-watching the other people who are scrambling into the other cars with a bored expression on his face. Sam steps over the edge of the car and slides back into the seat, tugging the lap bar down over the two of them before Mercedes can say anything.

He smiles when she raises an eyebrow. "You said it was your favorite."

She bites the corner of her lip just as the ride starts moving again. She grabs his hand again when the car goes spinning for the first time, squealing a little when the the spin reverses and it presses Sam's body up against her side. He likes the way that it feels, being this close to her.

The ride stops two more times for people to get off and on, but the man running it doesn't seem to care if Sam and Mercedes keep riding.

So they do.

"I might not be able to walk straight if we don't get off," Sam admits when the ride starts to slow for the fourth time since they got on. He swears he can see the pink in Mercedes' cheeks when she nods her agreement.

He's relieved that he's able to keep his feet under himself when he starts across the metal platform. "Did the tilt-a-whirl live up to expectations?" he asks when they're back on solid ground.

She glances back at the ride, then smiles up at him, her eyes bright. "Yeah."

They decide together that no other ride is going to beat an extra-long turn on the tilt-a-whirl, so they walk down the midway, dodging little kids and discussing the ways they rig the different games so that people end up paying twenty bucks to get a three-dollar stuffed animal. Sam doesn't have money to burn on stuff like that, and Mercedes knows that, but he appreciates that she's the sort of girl who doesn't buy into the false romantic gesture of the carnival game prize. It's like even if he could, she wouldn't want him to try to win her anything.

"What's your favorite carnival food?" Mercedes asks when they make their way out of the games and in what's basically a village of food stands.

"Cotton candy," Sam answers easily. "You can't get it anywhere else, at least not like it is at a carnival. My mom has this picture of me when I was like, four and I'd been eating cotton candy. It's pink all around my mouth and on my fingers and stuff."

"That's cute," she says, taking his hand and slipping her fingers between his. She tugs gently, and Sam lets himself be led until they're in line at a food stand that has bags of pink and blue cotton candy hanging up inside, lining the windows like an oversized Christmas garland.

"You know the worst thing about cotton candy?" she asks when she has a bag of the sweet stuff in her hand and they're walking away from the stand. "It deflates in humidity."

"The sugar melts."

"Right." She looks up at him shyly. "It's still early. We could take this back to my house and eat it while we watch a movie."

He hasn't kissed her yet, but right now, with the lights from a lemonade stand reflecting in her eyes and the sounds of the carnival in his ears, Sam really wants to.

A little boy, distracted by all of the excitement around him, walks into Mercedes' legs, and the moment is gone when his dad apologizes to her for it. She waves it off before looking back at Sam. "Yeah," he says. "Let's go to your place."

He takes her hand again while they walk, lacing his fingers together with hers. "In some places, they call cotton candy fairy floss," he says because it's what he's thinking.

"Really?" She smiles at him and squeezes his hand gently.

He's going to kiss her tonight. He has to.


End file.
